Things don’t really go well at . The publisher canceled three other games, after four titles . Not only that, the company announced another delay for skull and bones — the game we tried for the first time . The supposed pirate sim has finally appeared on March 9, but Ubisoft delayed it until the start of fiscal year 2023-24, which begins in April. This is the sixth publicly announced delay of Skull and Bones.
“Players will be able to discover the beauty of skull and bones in the upcoming beta period. The extra time has paid off and brought impressive improvements to its quality, which has been confirmed through recent playtests,” Ubisoft . “We believe players will be positively surprised by its development. We’ve decided to postpone its release to give more time to introduce a much more polished and balanced experience and build awareness. “
Meanwhile, the company has lowered its financial forecast target for the October-December quarter from about 830 million euros ($891 million) to about 725 million euros ($779 million). and did not perform as well as the company expected. “We are facing conflicting market dynamics as the industry continues to shift towards big brands and permanent live games, amid economic conditions,” said CEO Yves Guillemot. A worsening economy affects consumer spending.”
Ubisoft expects their net pre-orders to drop 10% this year. Previously, the company expected that revenue to grow 10%. All told, Ubisoft has reduced its estimated operating income for this year by about 1 billion USD.
Going forward, Ubisoft is tightening its belt and will focus on fewer games. The company is depreciating 500 million euros ($538 million) on research and development on canceled games, as well as upcoming free and premium titles. It also aims to reduce costs by more than 200 million euros ($215 million) over the next two years through “targeted restructuring, divestment of some non-core assets and normal natural attrition.” However, it plans to continue to hire “highly talented people” for its major projects.
Besides skull and bonesprobably the biggest title Ubisoft has on the notebooks for this year is . expected to arrive late March 2024. Other unannounced premium games are being prepared for the next financial year, including “a big game”. Free-to-play titles for some of Ubisoft’s biggest franchises are also in development. Given the current situation, the company will need most, if not all of it, to succeed.
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